While hunters are gearing up for Russellville’s Urban Deer Hunt set to start at the beginning of September, local food banks are getting ready for the hunters’ first kills.

Per registration requirements for the hunt, hunters are required to donate their first kill — which must be a doe — to Arkansas Hunters Feeding the Hungry, a nonprofit that aims to feed hungry locals. Hunters are required to drop off their first kill to one of 60 processors in the state that grind up the meat and ship it off to local food banks to disperse the meat to needy families in the area.

“If the deer’s dropped off locally at one of those processors in that area, it’s going to stay right there in that area,” said Ronnie Ritter, director of Arkansas Hunters Feeding the Hungry. “We don’t send it off to Little Rock or anywhere for distribution. It stays right there.”

The two most local processors, both in Dardanelle — Arkansas Quality Processors on Highway 154 and Wild Game Processing on Highway 27 — will take the task of de-boning the deer and grinding the meat into burger, and after receiving a large amount will begin sending it to two local food banks, Main Street Mission and the Manna House.

“If we had to go out and buy meat, we couldn’t do it,” said Marilyn Williamson, founder of Main Street Mission. “There’s no way we could purchase what they give to us. We couldn’t afford it ... They’re real wonderful to help us.”

Last year, Arkansas Hunter Feeding the Hungry, which now collects from seven statewide urban deer hunts, collected 68,000 pounds of meat from hunters to donate to foodbanks statewide, which translates to almost 275,000 servings of ground meat, Ritter said. When the nonprofit began in 2000, it collected 2,000 pounds of meat from hunters.

“Our eventual goal is to collect one million servings of wild game per year,” Ritter said. “Right now, we’re only getting a little over 1 percent of the total deer harvest. If we could get 5 percent, then we could reach our goal of 250,000 pounds, or a million servings, and we feel that’s attainable just through letting people know what we’re doing.”

Ritter said most game is accepted through the processors, including duck, elk, pork and even bear, which he said was donated from the Clinton area last year. He added that hunters don’t just have to donate their first kill, but are encouraged to donate more as they hunt, stating kills that are donated aren’t put toward a hunter’s five-tag limit.

“We get the first deer harvested, but we’ll take all of them if a hunter wants to give them to us,” he said. “Some in the past have killed 10-15 deer. Arkansas Hunters for the Hungry will take any and all deer the hunter wants to donate.”